Last but not least, there was Gemma. She’d had stars in her eyes since starring as Pilgrim Number Three in the fifth grade Thanksgiving play. Gemma had begged her parents to get her an agent (they’d finally relented in middle school), and since then she’d appeared in six commercials. Of their foursome, Gemma was the most fearless. She’d broken into the drama director’s office to sneak a peek at the cast list for Chicago before it was posted. She’d scored copies of the math test from their teacher’s locked drawer. Nothing she did ever got her in serious trouble, because the principal relied on her wealthy parents for generous donations to support the Fall Fair and Spring Fling. As the only member of the graduating class to ever appear on TV, Gemma had little chance of being overlooked in the yearbook.
“Oh my God, he’s here!” Holland said, jumping out of her seat. She pointed to where David Gross had entered the cafeteria, pushing a hand truck stacked with cartons of books. As if he was tossing hundred-dollar bills in the air, everyone rose at once and charged at him.
“He’s walking toward us,” Holland gasped. She was white as a sheet. None of them wanted to be around her if she got something that she deemed beneath her.
“Just like I told him to,” Gemma said, grinning. She popped a French fry into her mouth with obvious satisfaction. “I said he could squeeze my right boob if he brought the yearbooks here first.”
“Gemma!” Prisha clapped a hand to her mouth.
“We’ll see if I actually follow through. I think he’ll be satisfied with a look.”
David Gross had raging acne that hadn’t quit since the ninth grade. There was little chance he’d ever seen a live breast.
“Why the right one?” Suki asked, clearly amused.
“Saving the left one to find out who the prom king and queen are going to be.”
Holland threw a crumpled napkin at Gemma, but she was clearly grateful for the first look.
“Oh, hey, there’s Josh,” Prisha said, pointing straight ahead. “Right behind David.”
Josh Levine had been Holland’s boyfriend since sophomore year. They were an under-the-radar couple, hardly the sort worthy of gossip. Josh wasn’t a looker, but he was sweet and dependable and put up with Holland’s exhausting schedule of extracurriculars.
“Hot off the presses, ladies,” David said when he reached their table. Four hands grabbed at the top box on the pile, ripping into the packing tape.
“Got one,” Suki announced, the first to pry a book free. She flipped ferociously until she reached the superlatives double spread.
Gemma grabbed it from her hands and laid it flat on the table so they could all see at once.
“Most Likely to Cure Cancer . . . Prisha Chowdhury!” Suki announced. “Very nice.”
Prisha burned with pride. Her parents would like that. They would probably frame it next to her older sister’s valedictorian plaque on the mantel.
Holland cheered when she saw hers.
“Most Likely to be President,” she said, giddiness bringing her to her tiptoes.
“Nice job, babe,” Josh said, throwing an arm around her while scanning the spread for his own name, which wasn’t there.
“Suki Hammer . . . Most Likely to be a CEO.” Suki read her own aloud. Her mind raced to make sense of it. She had turned the school bake sale into a lucrative event with gourmet treats. And she’d gotten the student newspaper to take on advertising from local businesses. Yeah, it was starting to fall into place. She was happy with her honorific, and at least it had nothing to do with being Japanese, like Most Exotic.
“And Gemma Taylor gets Most Likely to Win an Oscar,” David Gross said, his eyes fixed on Gemma’s right boob.
“I’ll take it,” Gemma said grandly, in a voice that sounded like she was already onstage clutching her statuette, about to thank her family, friends, and agent.
“We did good, kids,” Holland said.
“You did,” David said. “Gemma, I’ll see you later.” He gave her a wink that made them all cringe. He and Josh walked off together.
“Think any of these things will actually come true?” Prisha asked. They had their heads huddled together, studying the rest of the superlatives now that they’d found their own.
“Obviously,” Suki said. “We’re going to light the world on fire.”
Chapter One
Holland
Westport, Connecticut
2023
Mom, there’s a fire in the kitchen!”
Cameron, Holland’s teenage daughter, was calling upstairs at the top of her lungs.
In her bedroom, Holland Levine quickly shut her laptop. She was in the midst of emailing with a promising guy she’d matched with on one of those dumb apps her daughter had insisted she download. She’d let Cameron do the technical work of setting up her profile, but she didn’t need her know-it-all, attitude-plus teenager getting involved with the correspondence. Besides, all she’d written to CTguy77 was, “Would luv to meet up.” Overly colloquial for a man who claimed in his profile to be an English professor, though nothing was for certain behind the curtain of the internet.
Holland ambled down the stairs, not exactly in a rush. Cameron was prone to hyperbole and drama, a trait that emerged around the time of her parents’ divorce. Holland took a moment to study the crack in the bottom stair, and then let her eyes rove over to the peeling wallpaper. Their house was showing its age, not unlike her. Getting the place shaped up would mean calling her ex, Josh. She’d rather live with the imperfections.
“Holy shit, Cam,” Holland exploded when she reached the kitchen. This time her daughter had not been exaggerating. Bluish flames were shooting into the air, and a cloud of smoke was quickly filling the room. “What the hell happened? Get the fire extinguisher.”
Cameron pointed to a tray of charred brownies. Holland went to tamp down the flames with a dish towel while her daughter rushed to the pantry, returning with the fire extinguisher.
Holland stared at the red canister. She had no idea how to use it. It was one of the things she’d bought after Josh moved out, along with a pole to change out-of-reach lightbulbs.
“Forget it,” Holland said, resting the fire extinguisher on the floor. “I think it’s dying down. Why are you baking, anyway?” Holland hoped she didn’t sound judgmental. Cameron had been hitting the sweets pretty heavily lately, and the results showed in her midsection, the same spot Holland wore every extra cookie.
“For the senior class bake sale,” Cameron explained.
Though her daughter was a senior at the same school Holland had attended, observing many of the same rituals and learning from a handful of the same teachers, the years felt like a hazy memory to Holland. She wished she could convey to Cameron how utterly insignificant anything that happened in high school was in the grand scheme of things. She wanted to reassure Cam that one day she’d barely be able to recall the details of a fight that made her bawl for hours, or the name of a boy she’d obsessed over.
“I totally forgot it was tomorrow.”
Because you’re not organized, Holland thought, but held her tongue. She didn’t want to say anything that could unleash one of their Get over it, I’m not you fights. After she and Josh had split, arguments between Holland and Cameron had grown more severe. “I want to spend the night at Dad’s” was one of Cam’s crueler retorts. But nothing hurt as badly as “Kelly would never say that to me.” Kelly was Holland’s replacement, fifteen years younger and with tits four inches higher.
“All right, let’s clean up this mess. Then we’ll swing by Bridget’s Bakery, buy some lemon squares, ugly them up a little so they seem homemade, and call it a day.” Holland reached for a wad of paper towels and started wiping away the mess.
“I love you, Mom. You’re the best!” Cameron said, wrapping her mother in a rare hug. Holland’s flesh prickled with goose bumps. She so rarely experienced physi
cal affection these days. Not from men. Not from her daughter. Not even from friends, who were few and far between. After the divorce, many of the women in her orbit had sworn they’d stick by her. Her closest mom-friend, Stacey, the mother of Cameron’s best friend Laurie, promised that she was eager for a third wheel for date nights. But after one trip out to a Mexican restaurant followed by a movie, Stacey never reached out to Holland to tag along again.
“Should we go now?” Holland asked, looking at her watch. It was only 5:30 p.m. She could race over to the bakery with Cameron and make it back in time to start dinner, then turn back to the work she’d brought home with her. She was one of two marketing managers at the local radio station, and her counterpart, Annie, was on maternity leave. If only the work was a bit more interesting, maybe she wouldn’t mind the second helping of it.
When Holland looked up, Cameron was already halfway out the front door.
“Don’t worry, Mom. I’ll just go myself. I’ll probably meet up with Laurie after.”
Not going to the bakery meant Holland had more time to herself. Cam would probably end up eating dinner at Laurie’s house, so she could even skip cooking. But as the allure of a quiet evening revealed itself to Holland, a sadness dogged her.
Holland sat down at the kitchen desk and opened her email. There was a message from Cameron’s guidance counselor. Cameron wasn’t nearly the student that Holland had been, so if Ms. Lafferty was reaching out, it wasn’t to alert her that Cameron had won one of the numerous prizes that Holland had collected back in her day. At least Cameron wasn’t a troublemaker, not beyond the typical teenage boundary pushing—some light vaping and a skipped class or two.
She clicked the email open, but fortunately it was just a reminder about an upcoming college prep meeting. Below that email was a message from Dr. Giffords, the school principal.
Dear Holland,
It’s hard to believe it’s already May! We are so proud of Camryn and all she has accomplished at Staples!
Holland blanched at the misspelling of her daughter’s name.
As I’m sure you noted from the Save the Date sent in the fall, your 25th reunion is around the corner. We are looking for some volunteers from the Class of 1998 to help make this weekend back on campus very special. Of course, you were the first person to come to mind, what with your exemplary record of leadership positions during your time here. And of course, your track record as the longest-serving PTA president speaks volumes.
Dr. Henry Giffords had been a first-year principal when Holland was a ninth grader. He’d come from an inner-city school where most of the homes were single parent and a sizable chunk of the student body relied on the public school for breakfast and lunch. It was culture shock when he arrived at Staples to find a parent body in a tizzy that the parking lot didn’t have sufficient spots for the seniors and that AP Mandarin wasn’t offered, two details that were quickly rectified.
Please let me know if you can find the time in your busy schedule to chair the reunion weekend. I can’t imagine anyone doing a better job.
Yours,
HG
Holland blushed, though she was alone. Flattery was her Achilles’ heel. It was the reason she’d taken on the thankless job of PTA president for the past eight years, chasing down parents who didn’t pay their teacher gift dues and never signed up for safety patrol slots. She loved the accolades at the end of the year, the moment when the student government president handed her a bouquet of roses at graduation in gratitude for her service. She loved sitting on the dais at school functions, sandwiched between the superintendent and the principal.
Holland had certainly not forgotten about the reunion. She just hadn’t decided whether to attend. It was yet another event where she risked being in the same room as her ex-husband and his new wife. Holland preferred to call Kelly a second wife rather than a new one, because it implied there would be a third.
Now, with Dr. Giffords’s offer, Holland felt certain she would go. She could attend the reunion with her head held high as reunion chair, making sure Josh and Kelly were seated nowhere near her but with a perfect view of the stage as she mounted the platform to welcome everyone. Fuck! She would need to start a diet. She looked down at her waist, where a roll of extra skin spilled inelegantly over the waistband of her jeans. Maybe she and Cameron could diet together.
Holland eyed the photograph tacked to the corkboard in the kitchen showing Suki, Gemma, Prisha, and her in Napa Valley. It had been taken seven years ago. Her high school friends had not disappointed her, unlike so many others, in rallying around her after the divorce. It didn’t hurt that Suki had offered to fly them all to the Auberge du Soleil resort for a long weekend of drinking, spa time, and fine dining. She’d picked up the tab for all of them, which had made the weekend too tempting to miss, even though it had been hard for Gemma to leave her new business and for Prisha to leave work and the kids. There were talks of making it an annual girls’ trip, and it had happened the following year, Suki bringing them all that time to a charming village in Colorado for skiing and rounds of après-ski cocktails. But the trips had fallen by the wayside as Suki’s star burned even brighter and her commitments grew in tandem. The rest of them were also burdened with obligations of their own, which made carving out the time to get away more effort than it was worth. Their friendship now existed mainly in the ether—monthly check-ins on group text.
Unpinning the photo, Holland brought it closer to her face and studied Prisha’s rare smile. Prisha was the most serious of their foursome. She’d been the kind of student who could be overlooked by a teacher because she rarely raised her hand, but when her perfect tests had piled up, she’d caught the attention she deserved. Her parents had also been the strictest of their group. Prisha had rarely gone to parties, had had to be pressured by friends into finally wearing a skirt above her knees (which she’d had to change into at school), and had been mincemeat if she’d missed curfew. Of all of them, her life had unfolded most predictably. Still, something always seemed missing. When she smiled, her eyes lacked a corresponding twinkle.
Holland decided to start her asks with the good doctor. She lived in New Haven, only forty-five minutes from Staples. It ought to be easy enough to convince her to come.
Prisha answered after three rings.
“Hang on a sec,” she said, and Holland heard her firing instructions at a nurse.
“You sound busy,” Holland said when Prisha returned.
“Always,” Prisha said. “What’s up?”
“Well, I’ve been asked to chair the twenty-fifth reunion,” Holland said. While moments earlier she had felt proud, saying it out loud made her feel childish.
“Of course you have,” Prisha said.
“Dr. Chowdhury, you need to sign some discharge papers before you leave,” a female voice said, and Prisha put Holland on hold again. It was easy to picture her friend at the hospital, looking the picture of calm and competence in her white coat as gurneys flew by. She kept her cool always, even when the mean kids in school had started calling her Clam Chowdhury.
“Ok, I’m back,” Prisha said. “So, what’s the plan for this reunion weekend? I put the date in my calendar ages ago, but I don’t know if I’ll be able to make it.”
“P, I need you there. Please, please. I can’t face Josh and the bimbo without my girls around me.”
Prisha sighed. Holland could hear her gears cranking, thinking who could watch the kids, how many days it would mean taking off of work.
“Isn’t Kelly a yoga teacher?”
Holland bristled. Bimbo, yoga teacher. Tomato, tomahto. “Whatever.”
“I’m just saying that Kelly might not be that bad of an influence on Cam. If nothing else, she should have good posture.”
“She doesn’t,” Holland said sharply. Her daughter slumped; her head was permanently rounded forward because of her cell phone
addiction. “Well, please try to be there if you can. Even if you only drive for one night.”
“I have to talk to Dev,” Prisha said predictably. Dev was her husband, an orthopedic surgeon with an ego that barely fit in the operating room.
“I understand. I’ll follow up,” Holland said, trying to sound breezy, when really her heart was pounding.
“I know you will,” Prisha said, and they both giggled. Holland was tenacious. A dog with a bone when she set her mind to something.
“Love you,” Holland said. “Say hi to—”
“Wait,” Prisha interrupted. “Is Suki going?”
Would Suki come? It wasn’t like Holland hadn’t already been wondering about it off and on since the moment the Save the Date had arrived.
“I don’t know yet,” Holland said. “But you know I’m gonna try.”
She hung up the phone and replaced the photo on the corkboard, next to one of Cameron’s elementary school drawings that she couldn’t bear to take down. It was a family portrait—her, Josh, and Cameron depicted as colorful stick figures. Instead of putting herself in the middle, Cam had drawn her parents side by side and put herself to the left, next to Josh. It was an unusual setup—Cam’s kindergarten teacher had even commented on it. “She must really love seeing you two together.”
Reaching again for her cell phone, she thought of how best to phrase the ask to Gemma. It would be the hardest for her, of everyone, to return to campus after what had happened at the twentieth.
Last Summer at the Golden Hotel Page 30